


Let Not Your Heart Be Stone

by foundCarcosa



Category: Fable (Video Game)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-04
Updated: 2012-07-04
Packaged: 2017-11-09 04:12:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 691
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/451125
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/foundCarcosa/pseuds/foundCarcosa
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The dead do not truly die, not if we are unwilling to let them go.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Let Not Your Heart Be Stone

The accommodations were sparse but cosy; thick windowless stone kept out the howling winds and driving snow, letting in not even the hint of a draft. Hammer bedded down with great enthusiasm, down-filled quilts pulled over her head as she snuggled into the mattress.

It was no small wonder the warrior monks were hardy and resilient. Forbidding mountain ranges that kept in cold and snow, hard-packed ground that sent jarring shocks up the calves and into the knees, a weakling sun that shone valiantly but imparted little warmth…

She never thought she’d say it, but she was starting to miss Albion. Perhaps, after a year and a day, she’d return.  
For now, she dreamt.

But it was not the rolling plains of Oakfield or the lush forests of Brightwall that unfolded before her slumbering mind. It was the inner chamber of the Spire, thrumming heartbeat and oily black stone, and Lucien Fairfax splayed out like an open-air sacrifice.

That wasn’t right. He’d fallen from the platform, propelled backward by the Hero’s shot. She’d even thought she’d heard his frail body crack, far, far below them.

But this was the place-between-realms, this was the dream-land, and here Lucien Fairfax bled out on the platform, eyes wide and unseeing, mouth slack and silent.  
Lucien, the man who’d started everything.

“I hate you, why are you here?” Her voice rang out, ricocheted, assaulted her own ears upon its return. “Can’t you stay away from me? Leave me alone!”

She kicked the body once, viciously, before awakening.

The next night, it was the same. The same dream, the same slick puddle of blood creeping towards her feet, the same shouts of hatred and the wish to be left alone. She wished to dream of Albion, of her friends, of crackling fires and Adam’s quirky smile and Garth’s unexpectedly-soft hair under her fingers as she braided with deftness she hadn’t realised she possessed.  
Her heart burned, _seethed,_ and so the dream returned again and again.

“You are not focusing, Sister Hammer.” In the weak daylight, she stood chagrined before Brother Teague -- but he lifted her chin and pegged her with a hard, shrewd look. “Something ails you. Remember what we teach here.  
The hardest battles are those fought within, and many of them need not be _fought_ at all.”

Once, in the midst of the dream, she didn’t shout at all. She simply stood, and stared.  
Stared at the body. Stared at the _man._ Stared at Lucien, he upon whom she’d spent so much energy. So much _negative_ energy.

When was the last time she’d thought of her father? She’d forgotten him in avenging him.  
Adam had spoken of Rose, wistfully, right up until the end. But she’d never spoken of Father, not once.  
 _“We’ll get Lucien,”_ she’d swear. Fist clapping against open palm. And that would be all.

 _“Don’t you hate him?”_ she’d ask, incredulously. Adam had, when they’d first met. He had, viciously. But he’d also killed every man in Oakfield right before leaving for the Spire, and had only wept for them once he'd returned from that place of nightmares.  
 _“Not anymore.”_ His smile had reached both sides of his mouth, and his eyes as well, rueful though it was.

_“Not anymore.”_

She could not summon the words to shout at the man bleeding out at her feet. He was frail, impotent, silent. Adam’s bullet was lodged deep in his breast. _He’d stared at the pistol as though it were foreign to him, and then dropped it. It’d skidded off the platform, fallen into the same abyss that Lucien had, and Adam seemed lighter for it._

“I was wrong,” Hammer murmured, stepping closer, crouching, unheeding of the blood.  
“I don’t hate you. Not anymore.  
And I won’t see you again, will I.”

She passed her hand over his eyes, bringing the lids down over them.

The next time she dreamt, Albion spread out lush and green around her, and Adam’s daughter leapt into her arms, and Garth was grumbling about the dragonflies, and she was warm; and for as long as she remained at the monastery, Hammer felt the northern cold no more.


End file.
